Over the last few weeks, many Coloradans could go outside their homes and see smoke from wildfires. In Fort Collins, Boulder, Colorado Springs and Durango, cars were packed in driveways, waiting for possible evacuation. People lost homes, the wildlife that could run did, and we saw elk, deer and bears fleeing through neighborhoods desperate to escape the blazes.

It was a frightening time.

Wildfires are not a new phenomenon in Colorado’s history. But make no mistake, the intensity of this season of wildfires is a preview of what may become the new “normal” for our state. Climate models predict that in a warming world, the western and southwestern U.S. will become drier and hotter, creating ripe conditions for wildfires.

The snowpack in Colorado at the beginning of June was only 2 percent of normal, mainly due to warmer and earlier spring runoffs. Bark beetle infestations, exacerbated by warmer winters, have turned forests into tinderboxes. In late June, temperatures in Denver soared to 105 degrees, one of the thousands of warm temperature records broken this year. Scientists recently announced that 2012 had the warmest spring ever recorded in the United States.

Scientists predict that in the western United States the number of acres burned by wildfires will double by late this century if temperatures keep increasing at their current rate.

When Gov. John Hickenlooper surveyed the fires around Colorado Springs, he told reporters at The Denver Post: “The bottom line is we’re just going to have to work through this — all of us.”

We know that Hickenlooper was referring to immediate efforts to contain the fire, but we urge Coloradans to interpret his words as a broader call to action to decrease our state’s contribution of greenhouse gas pollution to our nation’s hefty share of the world’s emissions.

Whether you believe man is contributing significantly to climate change or not, there is no doubt that the earth is warming, and carbon dioxide is a key culprit. It only makes sense to reduce that risk and cut the amount we pump into our atmosphere. An effective way to do that is to clean up our electricity supply.

It’s true that we have already taken significant steps in Colorado to diversify our energy portfolio, and increase our use of clean renewable energy resources. The state’s two investor-owned utilities are on track to meet 30 percent of their electricity needs with renewable resources by 2020, and the state’s municipal utilities and electric co-ops are set to meet their 10 percent renewable target by the same date.

In fact, Xcel Energy, the state’s largest utility in the state, will be producing 23 percent of its power from renewable energy, mostly wind, by 2013. We applaud Xcel for its commitment to diversifying ahead of schedule. Basically, Xcel Energy is on track to meet its renewable energy goals seven years ahead of schedule.

And as Xcel’s recent rate case highlighted, this early compliance with the renewable energy goals is not raising your rates. The recent rate increase was due to such mundane expenses as property taxes ($23.2 million), tree trimming ($15.6 million), and distribution grid operation and maintenance ($23.1 million).

In fact, according to Xcel, the fund that used to pay for renewable energy expenditures will have a $100 million surplus by 2017 or 2018, and $600 million surplus by 2021. About a quarter of our electricity needs will be met by clean solar and wind energy, at a total cost over the life of the policy of 2 percent, and with hundreds of millions of dollars left over.

But statewide, not every utility is held to the high standard of Xcel. The fact is that by 2020, less than 18 percent of Colorado’s energy will come from clean renewable sources. We need to do better than that. And as Xcel has clearly shown, it can be done, and it can be done quickly, with a positive financial implications for ratepayers.

Annie Lappé and Rick Gilliam work for the Vote Solar Initiative, a non-profit organization working to make solar energy a mainstream energy resource. They are based in Boulder.